Just Call Me A Crafty Frog: My first Blog Hop and a Treasure Box “found”

Saturday, August 28, 2010

My first Blog Hop and a Treasure Box “found”

I am so excited to be a part of my first Blog Hop. For my friends that are not familiar with a Blog Hop, it is an organized series of Blogs. Participants "hop" or travel from one blog to the next, reading posts and commenting on the bloggers work or thoughts. Some will be offering "blog candy" or prizes to a lucky visitor.

All of the bloggers involved have decided to do a special project using our Cricut Circle member exclusive cartridge “French Manor.” I really like the objects on this cartridge. They have a fun, old timey, old world look to them. Even though I love the cartridge finding a way to put it to use in my 3rd grade classroom was a bit daunting. Why for my classroom? If you read my previous post you would know I have also decided to challenge myself to try using all of my Cricut cartridges in my classroom. I finally came up with an idea while setting up my classroom this week; redo my “Treasure Box.” It is just a small plastic storage box with the pencils, erasers; silly bands… my students get to choose from when they do something special.

I used my Gypsy to weld), the layer of willkommen (pg 75), and the layer of merci (pg 76) to create an outline for the treasure chest. Then I welded just the center of the screen shape (pg 54) to add some detail. Originally I planned to just cut this out in brown vinyl and adhere it to the box. The lid and box are clear so you could see the goodies through the paper trial I had cut. I did not like that, so I enlarged the outline shape to cut a gold solid shape go behind the chest. While I was at it I cut a keyhole (pg 63) for the chest and another for my box side. This is the first time I have worked with vinyl. I had some problems with bubbles. There was so much solid area on both layers. I figure, since pirate’s chest of gold are usually old and battered my blemishes just help give it a beat up look. I finished the chest off by adding “Treasure” cut at 3” in the Storybook thin Font.